


Christmas 1977

by nightswatch



Series: A Series of Christmases [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas, M/M, Marauders' Era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-22
Updated: 2015-12-22
Packaged: 2018-05-08 10:24:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5493797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightswatch/pseuds/nightswatch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sirius is bored during the Christmas holidays and convinces Remus to visit him at his new flat in London.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Christmas 1977

**Author's Note:**

> I was actually planning on writing a fic with several Christmases, from 1977 to 1980, but then this one got really long and I ran out of time, so I'm posting this one on its own. I might still write the other years, just not in time for Christmas.

When there’s a knock on Remus’ bedroom door late at night on Boxing Day, Remus is already expecting his mother to poke her head inside to ask him if there’s anything he needs and maybe to set down a fresh cup of tea on his bedside table. Remus has spent most of the day wrapped in several blankets, slept for half the day and then started to slowly but surely make his way through all the books his friends and parents gave him for Christmas.

Quite frankly, he doesn’t remember too much about Christmas, having spent most of it locked up in a shed and all, but it could have been a lot worse. This morning, he was surprised to find that he got away with nothing but a few scrapes and a handful of quite spectacular bruises and an overwhelming tiredness that Remus is now ignoring in favour of reading his books.

He looks up when the door opens. It’s his dad who’s standing in the doorway, smiling at him. “Remus, your friend would like to talk to you.”

Maybe his brain is still a little fuzzy from the transformation, but Remus can’t really wrap his head around what his father just said. His friends are all at home, Peter is visiting relatives, James is with his parents, and Sirius is pretending to be a grown-up and has hopefully not completely destroyed his flat just yet. “What?” Remus asks, ever-so-eloquently.

“Your friend, Sirius, he’s on the phone.”

“The _phone_?” Remus echoes, because it somehow sounds even more ridiculous to him than _your friend would like to talk to you_. Still, he’s already freed himself from his blankets and is squeezing past his father to go downstairs.

It shouldn’t surprise Remus that Sirius has somehow figured out how to use a Muggle phone, he’s scarily enthusiastic about Muggle Studies after all, but Remus wasn’t actually expecting to hear from him. They would all go to Sirius’ new place for New Year’s Eve, but Remus was, until now, sure that Sirius would forget all about them while he enjoyed the newfound freedom of his very own flat.

Remus’ mother is sitting in the kitchen, knitting, smiling at him as he picks up the receiver. “Sirius?” Remus asks, not entirely convinced that this isn’t some kind of joke.  He usually doesn’t speak to his friends on the phone. No, actually he _never_ speaks to his friends on the phone, although he does remember giving them all his number at the end of their first year at Hogwarts. He has to admit that he’s a little surprised that Sirius held on to it for so long. He’s also surprised that Sirius wants to talk to him at all, because, well, because of a certain incident that Remus would rather not think about.

“Moony,” Sirius says, his voice so loud that Remus is sure his mother, and his father, who slipped into the kitchen behind him, must have heard as well.

“There’s no need to shout,” Remus says dryly. He can see his mother smirk. 

Sirius clears his throat. “Moony, old chap. How are you doing?”

“I’m fine,” Remus says and it’s not even a lie. He’s as fine as he can be on the day after a full moon.

Sirius is silent for a moment, then he says, “Yeah?”

“Yeah, perfectly fine, had a lovely Christmas,” Remus says, not even trying to hide the sarcasm. He hears Sirius snort on the other end of the line. “How about you?”

“Yes, um, it was... Christmas.” There is some shuffling. “Yeah.”

When Sirius remains silent, Remus says, “So, is there any particular reason you called? On the _phone_?”

“You say _phone_ the same way you say _dungbomb_ and I resent that,” Sirius mutters. “I can practically see you wrinkling your nose. Anyway, I just wanted to see how you were doing and I was just wandering about the neighbourhood, as you do, and I saw this magnificent phone booth. I’ve always wanted to use a telephone, it’s rather exciting, you know? And I thought, well, why not call my dear friend Moony, who probably had the most dreadful Christmas due to that furry little problem of his and cheer him up a bit.”

“I, yes, thank you,” Remus says. He has a feeling that that’s not all of it.

Sirius sighs. “Moony, listen...” _There we go_. “I was just wondering, because I know that you’re coming down for New Year’s, but I thought maybe, if all the books you’re undoubtedly buried under are boring, _maybe_ you’d want to come by, say, tomorrow? Just for the day. You can be back home in time for dinner, what do you think?”

“I...” Remus pinches the bridge of this nose. His stomach twinges and Remus wishes it would stop doing that, especially because he knows that this has nothing whatsoever to do with the after-effects of the full moon. He wants to, but there’s no way he can just go on a quick trip to London tomorrow. “I don’t think I can.”

Sirius hasn’t even replied yet, but Remus can already hear him pouting. “Why not?” Sirius asks. “Are you _sure_ that you’re fine?”

“I am, it has nothing to with... that.” Remus bites his lip, very well aware that his parents are listening in on their conversation, even though they’re trying very hard to pretend that they aren’t.

“You know, if you let me talk to your parents, I could probably convince them to let you go. They love me, I swear.”

His parents really aren’t the problem. They wouldn’t mind, and anyway, Remus is seventeen, they can’t make him stay at home. “No, it’s... I just can’t.” He wishes Sirius would just let it go, but Sirius doesn’t do him that favour.

“But why?” Sirius asks. He’s starting to sound uncannily like a petulant child. “Just take the Floo to the Leaky Cauldron and I’ll meet you there.”

“Our fireplace isn’t connected,” Remus says lowly. He sees his dad perk up at that. “Sorry, Pads.”

“What if you–” Sirius stops, trailing off into a soft _oh_. “Look, Moony, you have enough money to come on New Year’s, right?”

“Right,” Remus says.

“So just use that for tomorrow, take the Knight Bus, and I’ll give you–”

“No,” Remus says decidedly. He can’t go through life taking his friends’ money. He could try to apparate, but even though he’s fine in the general sense of the word, he’s not sure if he’d actually be able to make it to London without leaving behind a foot or some other, equally important, body part.

“Moony, come on, I’m bored and you’d be doing me a huge favour.”

“Why don’t you ask James to come by?”

“He’s busy,” Sirius says quickly. “Moony, please? Please. Moony, seriously. _Please_. I’m not above bribing you. I’ll buy you another book to bury yourself under.”

The point is, though, that Remus doesn’t want Sirius to buy him anything, but he also wants Sirius to stop saying please, because Sirius never says please. Now that he’s said it so often, it has become slightly unnerving and Remus needs him to stop. Anyway, this is Sirius. Remus doesn’t like to admit it, but he’s recently developed a tendency not to argue with him.

“Moony,” Sirius says when Remus apparently takes too long to answer. “I’d come pick you up, but I know that apparating makes you feel nauseous.”

Well, apparating makes pretty much everyone feel nauseous, but Remus doesn’t protest.

“There has to be some way to get you here. If I have to spend another day lying around on the sofa without anything to do, I’ll go bonkers. And it makes _noises_. Actually, it’s not just the sofa. Everything in that flat is out to get me.”

“I’m sure it’s not actually that bad,” Remus says lightly.

Sirius grumbles something under his breath. “So, are you coming tomorrow?” he asks and he actually sounds hopeful and Remus can feel his resolve crumbling rapidly.

Well, the Knight Bus isn’t that expensive and maybe Remus can scrape together some coins so Sirius won’t have to give him any money. He’s still torn between wanting to see Sirius and wanting to avoid talking about that certain incident that he doesn’t want to think about. Eventually, he hears himself sigh and say, “Fine.”

“You have my address, yeah?” Sirius says, apparently not surprised in the slightest that Remus has finally relented.

“I do,” Remus says, dragging his fingers through his hair. He thinks that he has a bunch of silver coins tucked away in his Hogwarts trunk. For a rainy day. It’ll be fine.

Both his parents look at him expectantly the second he hangs up the phone. “Sirius, he’s... I might go see him tomorrow,” Remus says as if it hasn’t been decided already. “I’ll be back for dinner.”

His mother looks worried for a moment and Remus feels a pang of guilt and then reminds himself that he’s supposed to be an adult who should be able to make decisions like that on his own. His friends might disagree, but most of the time Remus doesn’t feel much like an adult.

When Remus flags down the Knight Bus the next morning, his mum gives him a hug and his dad slips him the exact fare for the bus with a wink and before Remus can protest, the bus has appeared with a crack and all Remus can do is stammer a _thank you_ before he gets on.

The flat that Sirius’ uncle left him isn’t exceptionally hard to find and appears to be in a part of the city that is mostly populated by wizards, who seem to be trying a little too hard to blend in. Remus rings the doorbell and it lets out a shriek that has Remus wincing. The door is yanked open a moment later and before Remus can even take a proper look at Sirius, he’s already pulled him into a hug.

“Moony,” Sirius says into Remus’ coat, “finally.”

“It’s before noon, I was worried you might not even be awake yet,” Remus mutters and lets Sirius pull him into the flat. He looks around curiously, but doesn’t see anything that would be _out to get_ Sirius. “So, this is it.”

“This is it,” Sirius says and shrugs. “It’s a bit of a shithole.”

“It’s not too bad,” Remus mumbles, eyeing a bright orange stain on the ceiling.

Sirius follows his gaze and nods. “Shithole,” he says again. He scratches his head. “So, what do you want to do?”

Remus thinks for a moment, not sure what Sirius might be in the mood for. Actually, he expected that Sirius would just drag him along all day. Well, for one, he doesn’t really want to stand in the cramped hallway anymore. “How about a tour?”

“Follow me, dear Mister Moony, let me show you the world,” Sirius says and beckons him to follow him, first into the kitchen where some strange plant seems to be growing directly out of the windowsill but has apparently not tried to murder Sirius yet, unlike the sofa that indeed does make gurgling noises when Sirius shows Remus the living room.

Remus promises himself that he’ll never sit down on that sofa. “Charming,” he says flatly.

“Okay, now comes the best part,” Sirius says as he pushes Remus out of the living room and through yet another door. “And I’m not kidding, this is bloody fantastic. Look at that bed.”

Remus looks past the clothes that litter the floor, his eyes falling on Sirius’ bed. It is, without a doubt, the biggest bed that Remus has ever seen in his entire life.

“It’s very bouncy,” Sirius says and then goes on to wax poetic until he eventually stops right in the middle of a sentence and gives Remus a funny look. “Anyway, I guess you want to go to Flourish & Blotts?”

“I...” Remus frowns at Sirius, confused by the quite sudden change of topic. “Yes and I assume you want to go look at broomsticks?”

“Broomsticks are for amateurs,” Sirius says and leads the way back to the front door, where he pulls on his leather jacket. Remus hates that leather jacket. “The other day, I met this bloke who said he could get me a flying motorcycle. Amazing, right?”

 _Amazing_ is not a word Remus would use in this context. It’s something like _impending doom_ that comes to mind.

“Don’t give me that look,” Sirius says, even though Remus is quite sure that he wasn’t giving Sirius any kind of look. “I know it’s not legal, strictly speaking, but it would be so much fun.”

Remus highly doubts that he’d ever in his life consider riding around on a flying motorcycle fun, but he keeps his thoughts to himself, just because Sirius seems so excited and obviously didn’t have anyone to talk to ever since they all left Hogwarts for the holidays.

Not for the first time, Remus thinks that he should have invited Sirius for Christmas dinner. He’s sure his parents wouldn’t have minded; Sirius didn’t lie when he said that Remus’ parents liked him. In the end, Remus decided against it because of a certain incident that involved him and Sirius and some extremely aggressive mistletoe. Right, Remus is thinking about it, even though he promised himself that he wouldn’t think about it ever again the second it was over.

Nothing good could come of thinking about it.

Anyway, now he feels a tad guilty because Sirius, even though he kept saying that it was what he wanted, had to spend Christmas on his own in a flat that seems to be a tad hostile, depending on what room you are in. Well, Remus spent Christmas locked up in a shed, but he’s sure that the wolf would have liked having Padfoot there with him.

As they walk down the street, Sirius eyes him curiously and Remus starts to feel strangely nervous. “Is there something on my face?”

“Oh, there are a great many things on your face,” Sirius says, smirking at him. He grows serious a moment later, looks over his shoulder and leans closer. “So the full moon really wasn’t that bad?”

Remus shakes his head. He can still feel the bruises and the scrapes, but they’ll be gone soon enough.

“You know, I would have...” Sirius shrugs, like whatever he’s about to say doesn’t really matter, but the way his eyebrows are knit together tells a different story. “I would have come by, if you hadn’t wanted to be on your own. I guess we would have had to explain to your parents why you’re hanging out with a huge black dog, but still.”

For a moment, Remus isn’t sure what to say. Usually, Sirius is either trying very hard to be casual or he’s in full mischief-mode, bordering on obnoxious. There’s always drama surrounding Sirius Black and Remus has come to accept that a long time ago. It’s rare that Sirius says something he means, something that’s serious, or something that’s important to him. “Thank you,” is all that Remus says in the end. 

They walk to the Leaky Cauldron, it’s not too far, and Sirius doesn’t stop talking long enough for Remus to get more than one word in. Diagon Alley is not as crowded as Remus knows it from his visits during the summer holidays, but Remus does spot a few familiar faces from school.

“I was thinking we could go exploring,” Sirius says and grins. “Just a bit.”

“We’re not going to Knockturn Alley.”

“Your attitude is making me sad,” Sirius says and shakes his head at him. He slows his steps when they get closer to Flourish & Blotts. “But I guess your definition of excitement is staring at really old books.”

Remus only smirks, his eyes on a rather impressive tome in the shop window. He doesn’t pull the _I spent most of Christmas Day in a shed and that was exciting enough, thank you very much_ card, it’s not like he wants Sirius to feel bad about this, but Remus is really not in the mood to sneak around dark and dingy side alleys.

“You know what Diagon Alley needs,” Sirius says, not waiting for an answer, “Zonko’s. They should expand.”

Remus hums, trying to talk himself out of going into Flourish & Blotts. He can’t buy anything and he has half a dozen unread books waiting for him at home. But those books in the shop window are lovely and Flourish & Blotts always have the most beautiful special editions, so–

“Merlin’s pants, Moony, let’s just go inside already,” Sirius says, hands jammed into the pockets of his jacket, shifting his weight uncomfortably. He gives Remus a shove. “I know you want to.”

“No, it’s fine, let’s just...” Remus nods at the rest of Diagon Alley, stretching out before them. “I don’t need more books.”

“You’ve stopped needing more books about ten years ago, probably,” Sirius mutters.

Remus laughs. “Probably,” he agrees. “Well, I know you’ll be bored if you come in there with me, so if you want to go look at broomsticks after all...” He trails off with a shrug.

“Don’t be silly, Moony,” Sirius says and marches over to the door, “I didn’t ask you to come by so I could look at _broomsticks_.”

“No, apparently you asked me to come by so you could drag me to Knockturn Alley,” Remus mumbles under his breath, but is quickly distracted by the display in the middle of the ship that has all new publications stacked up in neat towers.

Remus can feel Sirius hovering close by, but he’s gone not too much later, now standing next to a shelf with rather dubious-looking books that Remus hopes he won’t actually take a closer look at. He stares at Sirius, hair hanging into his face as he inspects book titles, making quite the effort to look bored. He stops staring when he realises what he’s doing and starts leafing through a new and updated version of _A History of Magic_ instead.

He moves on after a while, stays in the Magical Creatures section for a moment, skilfully ignores the books on werewolves, and then gets a tad sidetracked in the Spell Books section, which is where Sirius catches up with him, grinning smugly.

“Sorry,” Remus says and quickly turns away from the books, “what time is it?”

“It’s actually tomorrow, we’ve been here all night. I slept on a shelf and used an ancient runes book as a pillow,” Sirius says. There’s a bag dangling on his arm.

“What’s that?” Remus asks.

Sirius’ smile grows even broader. “Nothing that concerns you.”

Remus is somehow convinced that whatever is in that bag will quite possibly aid Sirius in turning everyone in Gryffindor tower into chickens. Or maybe peacocks. That seems more like Sirius’ style.

“Are you getting anything?” Sirius asks and peers over Remus’ shoulder. He whistles. “ _Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches_. Nice one, Moony.”

Remus looks over his shoulder, his cheeks undoubtedly turning scarlet, even though he has no intention to charm any witches in the near future, or at all, really. It has more to do with the way Sirius’ face looks right now. Remus brushes past him, hoping that Sirius will follow him outside.

“So, what now?” Remus asks. “And don’t say Knockturn Alley.”

“Now we can go look at broomsticks,” Sirius says decidedly and drags Remus along.

Looking at broomsticks, Remus finds, isn’t as bad when Sirius acts like an overexcited puppy and rattles off facts that James would find incredibly interesting and that Remus pretends he’s interested in because James isn’t here. Sirius still comes to the conclusion that a flying motorcycle is better than any broomstick could ever be.

They peer into shop windows as they make their way back to the Leaky Cauldron, but Sirius doesn’t pull him into any more shops and, much to Remus’ surprise, doesn’t try to purchase anything potentially dangerous either. He’s still curious about that bag dangling on Sirius’ wrist, though.

“So, what did you get?” Remus asks, nodding at the bag. “ _Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches_?”

“You insult me,” Sirius says and sniffles. “As if I ever needed any help with charming witches.” He winks. “Or charming anyone, really.”

Remus ducks his head and pretends to find everything about Sirius completely silly and not in the slightest bit charming. He sighs and says, “To think I could be lying in bed right now, _sleeping_ , but instead I–”

“Oh, Moony,” Sirius interrupts, “don’t pretend that this is some huge inconvenience, you’re not having a bad time, are you?” He doesn’t wait for Remus to answer, because it’s pretty obvious that Remus is actually enjoying himself. “Are you hungry? I know a great place.”

The _great place_ that Sirius knows turns out to be not in Diagon Alley, but in Muggle London. Sirius grabs the sleeve of his coat, leading him straight through the Leaky Cauldron and outside, into the street.

“Where are we going?” Remus asks, looking around anxiously. It’s not that he’s scared of Muggle London, he’s rather intrigued by it, actually, but he still feels strangely conspicuous among all the Muggles rushing about. Neither he nor Sirius really belongs here, although Sirius moves about like he does. Remus needn’t have worried, though, and quickly realises that no one is paying them any mind.

“It’s the most magnificent fish and chips place,” Sirius says happily.

Remus recognises the neighbourhood; they’re not too far away from Sirius’ flat. Apparently he’s had a lot of time to go exploring – he points at shops and tells Remus about them as they pass. It seems that he’s already made friends with no less than five shop owners, although it’s entirely possible that Sirius is exaggerating severely.

“Sirius,” Remus says once they’ve reached their destination, “I don’t have any Muggle money.” He’s made sure that he has enough for lunch at the Leaky Cauldron, but he doubts that he’d get any food here with the handful of sickles and knuts in his pocket.

“You’re in luck,” Sirius says and pulls a twenty pound bill out of his pocket, “because I do. It’ll be enough for both of us, I totally have this Muggle money business figured out, don’t you worry.”

“I wasn’t worried,” Remus only says and follows Sirius into the small shop.

Sirius is in a remarkably good mood, which mainly shows itself in how he keeps trying to shove chips up Remus’ nose as they eat and Remus does his best not to accidentally choke on his food while he tries to bat Sirius’ hands away. The owner of the shop watches them with raised eyebrows and eventually Remus just elbows Sirius in the ribs, effectively silencing him at least until they’ve finished eating.

Admittedly, Remus likes Muggle London. He’s never spent much time here, but in the afternoon, when he follows Sirius through the streets while he shows him his favourite places – most of which he’s discovered during the past few days, it seems – Remus begins to understand why Sirius wants to come back here so badly after they graduate.

When it’s starting to get dark, they make their way back to Sirius’ flat, snowflakes starting to fall. Sirius is catching them with his tongue, huddling closer to Remus than strictly necessary. Remus isn’t quite sure if it means something, if he should even ask himself whether or not it means something, if Sirius is even paying attention to what he’s doing. Remus comes to the conclusion that he isn’t, because Sirius ends up nearly walking past his own flat.

“I should head home soon,” Remus says as Sirius unlocks the door with a tip of his wand. If he leaves right now, he has a chance of making it home in time for dinner.

Sirius’ smile crumples, only for a split-second. “Right, of course.”

“Well, I could stay for another half hour or so,” Remus says.

“I don’t want to keep you from your undoubtedly very important business,” Sirius says. He holds up the bag he’s been carrying. “That’s for you, by the way.”

Remus doesn’t take it. “For me?”

“It’s a Christmas present,” Sirius says.

“You already gave me a Christmas present.”

Sirius smirks. “Yes, I did, but since you gave me another one, I figured I should give you another one as well. It’s only fair.”

“I didn’t,” Remus says, or at least he’s pretty sure that he didn’t give Sirius two presents.

“I asked you to come by today and you did, didn’t you?” Sirius says. “That’s a pretty good present if you ask me.”

“That wasn’t...” Remus purses his lips. “You basically gave me no choice.”

“Take the book, Moony,” Sirius says, grinning when Remus does as he’s told.

He peers inside the bag and finds the updated version of _A History of Magic_ inside. “Thank you,” Remus says, knowing full well that telling Sirius off for buying him such an expensive book would do no good at all.

Sirius waves his hand dismissively like it’s not a big deal, although Remus is sure that Sirius knows it’s a big deal to him. “Well, I wouldn’t mind if you stuck around for a bit,” Sirius eventually says. “Maybe you can help me figure out what exactly is living inside that sofa.”

“Are you sure you want to find out?” Remus mutters. He toes off his boots and hangs up his coat together with his new book, padding down the hall with Sirius at his heels. Remus isn’t sure if he’s imagining things, but it looks like the sofa has inched a little closer to the window while they were gone. “Did it... _move_?”

“Do you think it’s trying to escape?” Sirius asks, his voice low. “Do you think I should help it out and open the door or something?”

Remus tilts his head, regarding the sofa with narrowed eyes. “Might be a boggart.”

“Well, boggarts don’t kill anyone, so I probably shouldn’t worry about having sat on it,” Sirius says, but still eyes the sofa warily.

“You still shouldn’t keep it around as a pet.” Remus knows how to get rid of boggarts, he’s done it a couple of times, the problem is that he’s not entirely sure if it’s not something else that’s living inside that sofa.

Sirius lets out a rather undignified yelp when the sofa rattles and visibly moves a few inches to the left. He clears his throat. “I’m going to _burn_ it.” He throws Remus a quick glance. “Are you sure you have to go home?”

“The sofa isn’t going to murder you,” Remus says lightly, even though he actually isn’t so sure anymore.

“Maybe I just want you to stay because I truly enjoy your company,” Sirius grumbles. “Have you considered that?”

Remus purses his lips. If it’s really just a boggart in that sofa, Sirius can certainly take care of it on his own. Still, Remus likes the idea of Sirius wanting him to stay, for whatever reason. “I told my parents that I’d be back for dinner,” Remus says, but that’s really the only thing that’s keeping him from sticking around for a while longer.

“Okay, but what if you told them that we have a very serious boggart situation to deal with and that you’ll be home for,” Sirius shrugs, “breakfast tomorrow morning. Maybe lunch. You have a damsel in distress to save, they’ll understand.”

“You are quite the damsel,” Remus mutters.

“And in distress,” Sirius adds, nodding gravely. “And dreadfully bored without you as well.” He grins and pulls a few Muggle coins out of his pocket. “Or I could just call them and tell them that my sofa has eaten you.”

Remus snatches the coins from him. “Fine, I’ll call them. Where’s that telephone, then?”

“Follow me,” Sirius says and leads him back outside.

It’s still snowing and Remus wishes he’d put on his coat before he followed Sirius outside. Thankfully, he can already see the red phone booth down the street. Sirius doesn’t protest when Remus starts walking faster and holds the door open for him with a wicked grin once they make it there.

Remus refrains from complaining when Sirius squeezes into the phone booth with him, but he can’t quite keep himself from letting out an annoyed huff.

“What?” Sirius says. “It’s snowing.”

“Maybe you should have put on a jacket.”

“Well, maybe _you_ should have put on a jacket,” Sirius says gruffly. He fidgets and buries his hands in the pockets of his jeans.

For a moment, Remus thinks that Sirius might want to say something else, or at least he looks like he wants to, but in the end he doesn’t, so Remus simply rolls his eyes and reaches for the receiver.

“You know, I was a bit scared that you might not come.”

Remus drops his hand again. “Because it was a completely ridiculous idea?” he asks. “Well, it’s a good thing that I’m usually inclined to go along with those, then.”

“No, I meant...” Sirius bites his bottom lip and lowers his voice. “Because of that thing. You know, the thing that happened.”

“Yes.” Remus nods curtly. “That thing.”

“I thought you were uncomfortable about the thing. You know, because you barely talked to me after. Then I thought maybe it was really bad, no, actually, I didn’t _really_ think that, because I’ve been told that I’m fairly good at the whole kissing business, but I did consider it. For approximately a second.” Sirius looks up at him, eyes narrowed. “Anyway, it’s not like we had a choice. There’s no way of getting around hexed mistletoe, right?”

“Right,” Remus says, trying to figure out why Sirius has chosen right now as the time to bring this up when they’re both squeezed into a phone booth and Remus can barely feel the tips of his fingers because it’s so cold.

“See, that’s why I was wondering why you started avoiding me afterwards. Because we didn’t have a choice. And it wasn’t that bad.”

Remus is rather disappointed that he has not yet perfected the art of vanishing into thin air. “I wasn’t avoiding you.”

“You were until you showed up on my doorstep this morning,” Sirius says, insistent. “Do you want me to apologise?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Remus mumbles.

“So it wasn’t the most horrifying experience of your life?”

Remus swallows hard. Far from it, and that’s actually the problem. “No.”

“Great, I’m glad we cleared that up,” Sirius says.

Remus tries, once again, to reach for the receiver, but Sirius catches his hand in his.

“Actually,” Sirius says, “that still doesn’t explain why you’ve been avoiding me. And don’t say you weren’t.”

The truth is that Remus was avoiding Sirius, because he found himself thinking of that kiss every time he looked at him. He was daydreaming in class, for Merlin’s sake. Remus prided himself in being the only one of his friends to have an attention span of more than a minute. “It’s just... you... I...” Remus wants nothing more than to get out of this phone booth because all he can think of is Sirius, who’s really close and really warm and still waiting for an answer.

Sirius doesn’t seem to be as impatient as he usually he is, he just watches him, carefully, and Remus can feel himself blush again.

“Sirius,” Remus says eventually, wondering if he can somehow reason his way out of this. He loses his train of thought when he feels Sirius’ hand settle on his hip. It’s not a casual sort of touch, it’s purposeful, and it reminds Remus of Sirius’ arms wrapped around his waist when he kissed him at Hogwarts three weeks ago. That kiss, it was something. Not just a quick peck on the lips. It was a real, proper kiss, not one you might give someone you didn’t actually want to kiss.

Remus’ throat feels dry. He thinks he might panic. He’s apparently also forgotten how to speak.

“I could do it again,” Sirius says. He sounds so casual and there’s a smile playing around his lips, but his eyes are serious.

Remus’ initial reaction is to splutter a string of unintelligible words.

“That was my second thought, you know. That you actually enjoyed yourself. I know it’s completely unheard of, Remus Lupin, Prefect, enjoying himself, but it’d be okay. With me, that is. It’s okay with me. I just felt like I should tell you, just in case that’s why you’ve been avoiding me.”

“It’s okay,” Remus echoes.

“I know I keep saying this, but you think too much,” Sirius says and takes a step closer. Remus ends up pressed against the glass of the telephone booth. He should be uncomfortable, but Sirius is crowding against him and his face is only an inch from Remus’ now.

Sirius reaches up, thumb brushing over the already fading scrapes on Remus’ neck, then his fingers sneak into this hair, gently pulling him down and into a kiss.

Remus doesn’t call his parents until half an hour later.

 


End file.
